Moosh:] wrote:
On 29 Jul 2003 23:31:37 GMT, Brian Sandle
posted:

Moosh:] wrote:
On 22 Jul 2003 12:45:08 GMT, Brian Sandle
wrote:
To my knowledge they only test people with protein that they expect the GM
plant to make. The actual plant could have the engineered promoters
switching on other genes, causing troubles you would not be looking for.

And do they look for unintended effects from mutations and cross
pollinating?

Possibly not as thoroughly as they ought. But those are not being applied
to such a wide sector of people as RR & Bt stuff, which goes to nearly
everyone in North America.

Mutations and cross pollinations go on constantly every minute in
every corn field in the world.

As I skimmed last article the living cell has tremendous
discrimination. It constantly controls repair of the faulty DNA
replication. But it may be defeated when too many or too clever
stresses are applied, that it is not used to dealing with.

When the tryptophan from GE sources killed some people it might not have
been discovered if the symptoms were similar to some other lethal
but fairly common disease.

But that tryptophan affair was nothing to do with GE.

If the govt thought that lack of purification could cause such a terrible
thing what have they done about preventing future such things?

Applied factory/product safety regulations?

Maybe they are starting some standards for alternative products now,
as we see with a first recall in Australia. But if purity troubles
alone could cause so many deaths with that one product and there
being such a lax approach and so many many products I would have
thought much more trouble would have been evident from purity
considerations alone. It must have been more that purity, or else
purity testing would have been brought in for everything
much earlier.


Linkname: The Thalidomide of Genetic Engineering
URL: http://www.i-sis.org.uk/tryptophan.php
size: 199 lines
Linkname: Speech by Jeanette Fitzsimons in Urgent debate on GE
decision - 30OCT2001
URL: http://www.ecoglobe.org.nz/ge-news/rcgm1o30.htm
size: 258 lines

The Royal Commission has been lauded by some as balanced, thorough,
informed, and many other plaudits. This was the same Royal Commission
which told the representative of oneorganisation, before they had even
made their presentation, that the Commission had already made their
decision and it would be the Great NZ compromise.
The same organisation, after handing in their written submission much
earlier, found there was an error and asked to correct it. They were
told it didn't matter as "no-one was going to read it anyway".
In fact the Commission disregarded a great deal of evidence which did
not support its conclusions and made numerous errors of fact - for
example in its reporting and assessment of evidence about the
poisoning of thousands by GE tryptophan

Sounds like grasping at straws -- after their key witness a few years
ago was charged with falsifying evidence?
The tryptophan poisoning had nothing to do with GE.


Linkname: The Thalidomide of Genetic Engineering
URL: http://www.i-sis.org.uk/tryptophan.php
size: 209 lines
[...]

Those who search the Internet on this topic will soon discover
the claim by apologists for GE that the problem was only
decreased purification of tryptophan. We disagree for several
reasons - mainly, the first 3 GE strains had been causing EMS
(about 100 cases) for years before this slackening of
purification procedure in Jan 1989 when also the 'superproducer'
strain went into production and caused the epidemic. But this
question cannot be settled with finality unless Showa Denko
releases the GE microbes for detailed examination.

Whether you believe the impurities were due to incompetent
purification & monitoring, or to deviant metabolism in the
GE-bugs, or both, you had better believe that the fabled
'substantially equivalent' assumption flopped in that epidemic
of crippling & lethal illness.

Although GE proponents claim that the EMS epidemic was caused
solely by faulty filtering, it is possible to question their
seriousness. None of them has publicly argued that the Health
Food supplement industry should be subject to legal controls for
purity & efficacy comparable to those applied to the
pharmaceutical industry; yet this would be logical if indeed
such a deadly epidemic occurred solely as a result of inadequate
purification in manufacturing.

Either way, biotechnology - which includes GE but also includes
other processes such as purifying the mixture "lyprinol" from
green-lipped mussels - requires much-enhanced scrutiny.
[...]

I can
list several cases of food stuffs that case harm bred with conventional
methods an you can't list a single one with GM methods.

They get withdrawn if they cause trouble that is plain obvious.

Just like foods from plant mutations and cross-pollinating, only these
are more likely

Who is doing studies comparing recent health changes in countries with GM
food compared to countries with non-GM? Who is ready for what may show up
in the next generation?

Health is always being monitored by hundreds of thousands of health
professionals. Have you got ANY evidence of any problems?

I rely on what is allowed to be published. I note how the cigarette
and asbestos industries were aware of the risks of their products
though kept them covered.